• Question by: Peter Hulme Cross
• Meeting date: 17 November 2004

Well, should not the decision be that of Westminster Council? I understand that Westminster Council have, in fact, offered a compromise that outside South Africa House would be an appropriate place to put it. Personally, I can think of no more appropriate and ironic place to put it than outside South Africa House, and to pursue it in the courts with Westminster Council seems to be extremely perverse, if not reprehensible.

• Question by: Dee Doocey
• Meeting date: 17 November 2004

Would you not agree that spending up to £100,000 of taxpayers' money was not the right thing to do in a dispute between you and Westminster? I have a lot of sympathy for what you are trying to do, and I understand the constraints, but there has got to be a better of resolving your differences than going through the courts using taxpayers' money.

• Question by: Jennette Arnold OBE
• Meeting date: 17 November 2004

Mayor, would you agree with me that UKIP Members must really get to grips with the fact that they are representing London and should really get out there and just see London, and if Peter Hulme Cross was to walk round Trafalgar Square then he would see that Trafalgar Square is big enough for two Nelsons, and he would then confirm that there is insufficient room for a statue outside South Africa House, because this would create a road safety problem. That is the key thing. There is not enough room on the pathway to take the statue.

• Question by: Elizabeth Howlett
• Meeting date: 17 November 2004

I am very encouraged to hear you talk this morning in such positive terms about the second phase of the East London Line into Clapham Junction. My constituents, for one, will be very pleased with that. I do agree with you that it would be sensible to actually have a stop in Brixton, but if you have difficulty there, because that is going to depend on developers putting in capital monies for the redevelopment, will you hold up the whole of this second phase in getting your deal in Brixton, and therefore, we could wait even longer for a stop...

• Question by: Darren Johnson
• Meeting date: 17 November 2004

You say that it will be a metrorail service, rather than a Tube service, but can you reassure Londoners that it will appear on the Tube map still in the distinctive orange colour, which everyone has come to know?

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 17 November 2004

They were making promises they did not understand.

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 17 November 2004

I think Londoners will welcome your promise that you are going to build the East London Line by 2010, but we have to see that in the context of the statement that you made that it was at the bottom of the SRA's list in the past, and yet the Labour Party Manifesto, which you promoted in 2001, said that it would be built by 2006, so according to them it was near the top of the list. What is it that makes you believable, when obviously we could not believe Stephen Byers (MP) on this?

• Question by: Lynne Featherstone
• Meeting date: 17 November 2004

Yes, the Liberal Democrats are pro-bond. What came up at committee was the real fear of - and what I worry about with TfL is - the slippage, the risk, and the underwriting. That is the real difficulty; it is perhaps the confidence one has, having watched projects, having watched what is happening, say, on the slippage in the private contractors that you are meant to be controlling under the PPP. Actually, if it goes wrong beyond the £270,000, then what? The risks are huge here.

• Question by: Lynne Featherstone
• Meeting date: 17 November 2004

No, no, I want it all to go right.

• Question by: Lynne Featherstone
• Meeting date: 17 November 2004

Then why do you need to pay £270,000 to discover it?